In white tie and tails with his white beard, the tall, German-born Mr. Seibel was an imposing figure on the podium when he faced a stageful of musicians.

But friends and colleagues on Monday remembered someone who was more than a versatile musician who not only conducted but also played the piano, flute and French horn.

He was, they said, a man who loved New Orleans, the French Quarter in particular. He owned a house on Ursulines Street, and he and his wife celebrated a wedding anniversary at the Ursuline Convent. After Hurricane Katrina, Mr. Seibel opened his home to orchestra personnel who needed places to stay, said Babs Mollere, its managing director, who was one of those who stayed there.

And for the orchestra’s Beethoven and Blue Jeans concert series, Mr. Seibel traded his formal wear for denim.

“He was a good musician, but beyond that, he was a great guy,” said Carlos Miguel Prieto, who succeeded Mr. Seibel as the orchestra’s music director in 2005. “He was a generous person before he was a great musician.”

Prieto learned of Mr. Seibel’s death shortly before he was to lead the Naples (Fla.) Philharmonic in, among other pieces, Beethoven’s “Eroica” Symphony, which has a second movement named “The Funeral March.”

Prieto dedicated the performance to his predecessor.

University of HoustonKlauspeter Seibel.

“The Funeral March is sad but uplifting,” Prieto said, adding that the coincidence “gave me a chance to honor him in a very deep way.”

A native of Offenbach, Germany, Mr. Seibel studied at conservatories in Nuremberg and Munich. For almost 20 years, he was a professor of conducting at the Hamburg Conservatory of Music, and he was a co-founder of the Dirigentenforum, a national program for young conductors.

Mr. Seibel worked with several youth orchestras, including the German Youth Orchestra. In the United States, he taught at the Juilliard School, the Texas Music Festival, the Chautauqua Institution and Indiana University.

In Germany, Mr. Seibel was music director for the Frankfurt, Kiel and Freiburg operas and the Nuremberg Symphony, and he held contracts with opera companies in Hamburg, Dresden and Frankfurt. He also worked with orchestras and opera companies across the United States.

Mr. Seibel was “one of the greatest musicians I’ve ever known,” said Jim Atwood, who plays the kettledrum in the LPO.

“He was a master at shaping and refining the sound of an orchestra, focusing with incredible precision on small technical details and nuances as well as overarching stylistic and musical issues,” Atwood said. “His powers of perception, musical insight and musicianship never ceased to amaze me and my colleagues.”

Mr. Seibel received the City of Munich Richard Strauss Award, and Loyola University gave him an honorary doctor of music degree in 2008.

After Mr. Seibel retired from the LPO, he was named its principal guest conductor, meaning that he led the orchestra twice a year.

One of those appearances was in March 2006. Besides occurring shortly after the LPO had reconstituted itself after Hurricane Katrina, the performance came a week after the death of his first wife, Jutta Seibel-Reumann.

“He conducted the orchestra in a memorial piece to his wife,” Mollere said. “We couldn’t speak. It was totally memorable in every way.”

For Mr. Seibel’s last two appearances with the LPO, his cancer had progressed to the point where he had to conduct from a chair.

But the show went on, Mollere said, and Mr. Seibel had spoken of returning to New Orleans in March for his next conducting date.

“He was the iron-willed individual who was the consummate professional when he got on stage,” she said.

At the LPO’s Friday and Saturday concerts, the musicians will perform “Nimrod” from Edward Elgar’s “Enigma Variations” in Mr. Seibel’s memory, Mollere said.

Other LPO tributes will held, she said.

Survivors include his wife, Hanna Seibel; a son, Fabian Seibel; and two daughters, Anne-Katrin Seibel and Bettina Seibel.

Funeral arrangements are incomplete.

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Reminiscences by Klauspeter Seibel's friends and colleagues are at www.NOLA.com.